


White Collar Timestamps

by embroiderama



Category: White Collar
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angst, F/M, Fluff, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Multi, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-19
Updated: 2014-08-19
Packaged: 2018-02-13 21:48:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 23
Words: 12,662
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2166360
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/embroiderama/pseuds/embroiderama
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A collection of timestamps written for various White Collar stories.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Not Lost But Found timestamp

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to everybody who has ever prompted me for a timestamp! I will post White Collar timestamps I write in the future as additional chapters here, so if you want to see them and don't follow my journal on LJ keep an eye on this "story."

Timestamp to [Not Lost But Found](http://archiveofourown.org/works/2158518)

The EMTs at the scene wanted to bring Peter out on a gurney. They wanted to strap him down with a backboard and a neck brace, and the broken man Neal had seen when he first came through the door would have allowed it. Neal had never seen that version of Peter before--not when Elizabeth had been kidnapped by Keller, not when Peter had been taken off to prison. Until Neal saw the mocked-up Polaroid and understood what Peter was thinking, the look on Peter's face and the whole broken slump of his body made him sick with dread, imagining what they might have done to Peter or what they might have made Peter do in the hours since he'd been taken.

When Peter finally understood that Elizabeth was okay, the life returned to his eyes and his spine straightened enough to hide the broken pieces inside but Neal could still see them. He could feel Peter's body shaking when they hugged, and he knew it was more than the cold floor making him shiver. Still, Peter wouldn't allow the EMTs to even begin to evaluate him, much less treat him and pack him into their ambulance. He stood up, and he wavered in place but he put one hand on Neal's shoulder and the other on the wall until he was steadier.

"Boss," Diana said, "you should really let them check you out."

Peter nodded. "Take me to my wife, and they can treat me there."

Diana opened her mouth to argue but then she must have seen something in Peter's eyes. "Then let's go right now." She put her hand on Peter's arm, Neal stayed on his other side, and between them they swept Peter up, out of the building and into her car.

Diana put the bubble-light on the roof and cut a path through the mid-day traffic while Neal sat next to Peter in the back seat. He could hear Peter breathing, and despite being controlled, a forced cadence of in and out, Neal could hear the unsteadiness. Peter was sitting up so straight that his chest was straining against the seat belt, but the drawn pallor of his face and the way his eyelids drifted closed every couple of minutes made it clear that he was holding himself up with energy he didn't have. Neal would have tried to make him relax, but there was no point. He kept his hand on Peter's shoulder, and Peter didn't lean into the touch but he didn't shake it away either.

"We're almost there," Diana said as the hospital loomed in the near distance. "They're going to bring out a wheelchair for you."

Peter shook his head, but he didn't reply. Peter unbuckled his seat belt as Diana pulled into the Emergency entrance, and Neal did the same. He wasn't even slightly surprised when Peter opened the door, forcing Diana to stop with a lurch. Peter climbed out of the car, and Neal scrambled across the seat to follow him. Peter couldn't suppress the groan of pain or the way his body wavered, but he pushed forward, long strides taking him through the doors.

Neal kept a hand on Peter's back and steered him down the hall to the cubicle where Elizabeth was being treated. They burst through the curtain to find Elizabeth awake, sitting up, and talking to a doctor. The doctor looked startled by their intrusion, but Elizabeth reached out and Peter body-blocked his way past the doctor to take her in his arms. Peter was wordless, breathing in stuttering gasps with his face buried in her hair.  
Elizabeth wrapped her arms around Peter's back but looked at Neal with wide, questioning eyes. "Oh, hon," she whispered. Peter's head dropped to her shoulder as his knees gave way, and El shrieked as Neal grabbed on to Peter's jacket to slow his descent. The doctor jumped in to help control Peter's fall, and it wasn't until they had Peter safely on the floor that Neal felt the panic kick in.

His heart pounded in his ears as he watched the doctor call for help and attend to Peter, and he backed away until he bumped into something--somebody. It was Elizabeth, who was out of the bed now, barefoot in a hospital gown. Neal grabbed a blanket from the bed to wrap around her, but she didn't seem to notice as she looked between her husband on the floor and Neal in front of her.

"What happened to him? Neal!"

"He's not--I don't think he's hurt badly. But they--"

A low moan game from the floor, and Neal was relieved to see that Peter was reacting to the medical staff's actions even if he wasn't exactly awake.

"But they what? Damn it, Neal!"

Neal turned to look at her and tried not to see the constructed reality of that Polaroid. "They convinced him that you were dead, that they had killed you. They staged a photo while you were unconscious."

Her face twisted in revulsion and she pulled the blanket around her. "That's sick. Did you see it? What did they--"

"You were under the covers in your pajamas. I don't think they moved you. They put something that looked like blood on your pillow and created a convincing entry wound here." Neal gently touched the side of her head, and she lifted her hand to cover the spot.

"There was something in my hair."

"It was probably latex and some kind of adhesive. Under the circumstances, I don't blame him for believing it."

She nodded, and they both stood and watched as the medical staff loaded Peter onto a gurney. "What's happening?" she asked the doctor.

"We're going to run a head CT and probably some x-rays but your husband is reacting well to stimuli. My guess is that he has a mild concussion and that whatever happened here was just overwhelming."

Elizabeth leaned into Neal's side, and when Neal nudged her back toward the bed she didn't argue. The medical team wheeled Peter out of the room, and Neal wanted to follow but he could see Diana in the hallway along with other people in FBI hats and jackets. Peter was going to be fine, and he'd want to know that his wife was safe and not alone.

Neal wasn't about to let him down.


	2. One Cold Night timestamp

Timestamp to [One Cold Night](http://archiveofourown.org/works/1180156)

El woke up feeling warm and strangely confined, and it took a moment of shifting around under layers of covers and clothing to remember what had happened. Peter was still asleep next to her, and she rolled away enough to get to a cooler part of the bed but she hoped it wasn't enough movement to wake him up. As soon as he woke, Peter would no doubt be intent on making calls to get an electrician out to the house, not to mention looking into options for repairing or replacing their heating system. The sunlight coming in through the curtains was dim enough that El thought it was still early morning, and Peter deserved to sleep while he could.

Comfortable again, El yawned and fell back to sleep herself. When she woke, the sunlight in the bedroom was much brighter and Peter was sitting on the side of the bed, dressed in layers and holding out a large cup of coffee with steam coming out through the opened lid.

"Good morning," she said as she pushed herself up and reached out for the cup.

"Good morning. I picked up some breakfast too."

"I could've gone on the coffee run. I know you have enough to do here."

Peter smiled, the sweet smile that made El fall in love all over again every time she saw it. "But I wanted to let you get some sleep."

"I love you, honey." And she really, really did.


	3. Mirror, Warped timestamp

Timestamp to [Mirror, Warped](http://archiveofourown.org/works/868280)

Neal looked at himself in the mirror and took a deep breath. He scrutinized his face, looking for traces of the injuries that had left his face a bruised and broken mess just months earlier. The stitches had healed with a scar that was only visible if he looked at himself very closely in very good light, and the bruises and swelling were long gone. His bones had mended in good alignment, as he'd been told they would, but he thought he could see a difference sometimes. If he caught himself at the wrong angle he would see something in the shape of his face that was not quite right, not quite familiar.

He hadn't said anything about it to Peter or Elizabeth. He wasn't sure, really, if the difference he saw was physical or just a projection of what he felt inside. The emotional instability caused by his concussion had passed after a day or two, but it had shaken loose something inside of Neal that he hadn't managed to put entirely back in place. There was a kernel of truth in every fear, and Neal found himself wondering sometimes how much of what he had in life came to him as a result of his looks and how much he could lose if he were permanently damaged. How much he would lose as he grew older. Neal didn’t obsess about the subject, but he found himself dwelling on it in quiet moments.

He had to admit, despite his worry, that all evidence pointed to the conclusion that Peter and Elizabeth would still be in his life, even if his face were rearranged and left that way. The gentleness and kindness they’d shown him after the beating were almost painful to remember but at the same time they were a charm he held onto, a reminder of their love.

Neal had hoped that he wouldn’t have to be involved in the case against Edward Griffin, the man who had beaten him, but the evidence for Griffin’s financial crimes had been compromised and now the assault charges were the FBI’s best bet for getting a conviction that would lead to serious prison time. There was obvious evidence of Neal’s injuries as well as witnesses to the attack, but Neal’s testimony was necessary as well. Back when he’d still be a CI, Neal had been eager to testify in court, but it was a lot less appealing to be involved as a victim rather than an expert witness with charming magic tricks.

“Are you ready?” Peter called from the hallway, and Neal shook himself out of his thoughts.

“I’ll be right there.” Neal ran his hands through his hair then opened the door and gave Peter a smile that was mostly genuine. “Let’s go.”

~~~

 

In court, Neal sat next to Peter and tried to distract himself with people-watching. The jury was fascinating to watch, but not fascinating enough to keep Neal from seeing the photos of himself, blown up to three times lifesize and propped up for the jury to view. His face in the photos was injured in almost every way—bruised and broken, cut and scraped, swollen and discolored. It was alien and monstrous, and Neal felt sick from the fuzzy, uncertain memory of looking at that face in the mirror and feeling like his life was over.

Peter squeezed Neal’s hand, and Neal was grateful that Peter had come with him though he was equally glad that Elizabeth had agreed to skip the trial. Neal didn’t want her to see this, not again. He knew that was probably sexist and likely unnecessary, but she was somebody who was meant to beautiful things and he didn’t want to be responsible for more ugliness in her life. Peter argued that Neal wasn’t responsible for any of it, and that made sense but it didn’t change how Neal felt.

Sitting in court, Neal found himself staring at those pictures rather than listening to the doctor’s testimony, and like the way a word repeated too many times would seem to lose its meaning, after a while the pictures somehow stopped being Neal’s own face. It was a stranger’s face, a terribly injured stranger, and Neal realized that despite how horrible the face was, what he felt more than horror was sympathy.

He glanced sideways at Peter and merged the images in his mind so that it was Peter’s face that was bruised and broken and all the rest. Neal’s stomach clenched at the thought, and he squeezed Peter’s hand because if that was Peter’s face Neal wanted to reach out and touch him gently and take care of him and love him even more than ever. Tears stung from behind Neal’s eyes, but he blinked and breathed through his nose until they backed off. He would be called to the stand all too soon.

Peter leaned over and whispered in Neal’s ear. “Are you okay with this?”

“I’m okay,” Neal whispered back.

In a few more minutes, both sides were done extracting medical minutia from the doctor, and Neal was called to the stand. He kept his eyes on Peter as he was sworn in, and when he finally looked over at the man who had beaten him he felt disgust but not fear. You didn’t break me, he wanted to say. I’m not broken.

Neal answered the questions he was asked, straightforward facts rather than magic tricks, and he saw Peter watching with pride in his eyes and anger in the tense set of his jaw. When he was released from the stand, he went back to his seat knowing that he would end the day in a warm bed full of love, and Griffin would end the day in a cold bunk full of fear. He took Peter’s hand and held it tight to remind Peter that he wasn’t broken and he wasn’t going anywhere. Anywhere other than home.


	4. Till the Sun Cries Morning timestamp

Timestamp to [Till the Sun Cries Morning](http://archiveofourown.org/works/1180169)

Peter was in DC for a meeting, a quarterly ritual of driving south, spending several hours in the Hoover Building, then driving home in the evening. The Bureau would have paid for him to stay in a hotel overnight but Peter was more interested in getting home to El and Neal, now more than ever. The fall time change had brought on early nightfall, and Neal’s anxiety about the longer hours of darkness was all too obvious. Peter couldn’t change the length of the day any more than he’d been able to save Neal from the things that had taken him, hurt him and used him, and the sense of his own impotence rankled. If he couldn’t fix anything for Neal, at least he could be there as much as possible.

Nonetheless, when Peter’s meeting ended early he headed down to the basement of the Hoover Building rather than going directly to the parking deck and getting on the road back home. He hesitated when he found the right door then shrugged it off and knocked. He was getting ready to go back to the elevators when the door finally opened. The man who answered the door was about Peter’s age, a couple of inches shorter and somewhat slimmer, with shaggy hair, wearing a rumpled suit with his tie loosened.

“Yes?”

“Agent Mulder? I’m Peter Burke from the White Collar Division up in New York.”

“Burke? Oh, right. Right.” The agent turned away from the door but called back over his shoulder, “Come on in.”

Peter looked around as he walked in, and he wasn’t surprised to see a barely contained chaos in the office. Fox Mulder had already been infamous when Peter was in training at Quantico. At the time, Peter had been slightly in awe of the man who’d been no older than Peter but alread an established agent with years at Oxford on his resume. It didn’t take long for Peter to hear enough things that made him happy to take the slow, conventional road to success within the Bureau. He never imagined that he would find himself consulting with the man, on a personal matter no less.

Agent Mulder dropped into a chair and leaned back to put his feet up on the desk as he gestured for Peter to take the empty chair across from him. “Let me guess, you never thought you’d find yourself darkening my door.”

“Not really, but I get the feeling that you’re significantly less surprised.”

“I’ve heard things.” He held up a hand when Peter opened his mouth. “Not through Bureau channels or anything else government. I know people who know things.”

“Is it safe for us to talk here.”

“You mean bugs? No, this office is clean.”

“Okay.” Peter nodded then sighed. “Since you know so much about this—this insanity, is there anything I can do? Anything to keep him safe?”

“You can find a lot of suggestions on the internet.”

“A lot of woo and bullshit, you mean?”

“There’s something to be said for the placebo effect.”

“God damnit, I don’t want a placebo. I want to be able to keep my—my friend safe.”

“Haven’t you figured out that there’s no such thing?”

“I can’t accept that. How do you live with it?”

“I live with it the same way you live with the rest of the frankly awful uncertainties of life. You live with it because there’s no alternative.”

“There’s nothing I can do?”

Mulder tilted his head to the side and back. “You can go home, Agent Burke—home to those people you love. If I’ve learned anything, it’s that we humans have a remarkable ability to survive anything that doesn’t kill us.” There was a droll edge of humor in the man’s voice, and Peter wanted to take a swing at him, but he just gritted his teeth and stood.

“Thanks for your help.”

“Any time.”

Peter left the cluttered office behind him and didn’t waste any more time in getting to his car and pointing himself northward. The smug bastard had been right about one thing; Neal had survived, and all of them would continue surviving together. Even if it was false, he would whisper words of safety into Neal’s ear for the rest of his life. Every day, every night, whatever it took to make them all believe.


	5. The Undergraduate timestamp #1

Timestamp to [The Undergraduate](http://archiveofourown.org/works/868265)

Peter stood in the middle of Neal's new office and turned around, taking in the diplomas proudly displayed on the wall. "You remember that old case at Eastside University?"

Neal laughed. "I do. It's kind of crazy, right?"

"On the Neal Caffrey scale of crazy, I think this one is pretty good."

"That's the Dr. Caffrey scale, thank you very much."

Peter shook his head, but he couldn't repress the smile that made his cheeks ache. In the years since Neal had become a free man, his own man, Peter had been proud of him many times and somehow both surprised and not surprised by the various paths Neal had chosen to take.

Neal, as far as Peter knew, had left the life of crime entirely behind, but becoming a law-abiding citizen hadn't turned him into a guy who was content with a steady job and a 401k. After working for the Bureau for a while as a full-time consultant, Neal had cut his hours in order to be able to graduate school full-time. June was involved, Neal picked up some authenticating work on the side and somehow he worked it all out.

Peter never could have imagined when he was chasing Neal Caffrey, the reckless young thief, that he would one day be standing in the office of Neal Caffrey, adjunct professor of criminology with a consulting business on the side, a book on the way and traces of silver in his hair. He never could have imagined this kind of future, but now that it was here it felt like the most right thing in the world.


	6. The Undergraduate timestamp #2

Timestamp to [The Undergraduate](http://archiveofourown.org/works/868265)

Neal was wading through student emails when he heard a light knock and looked up to see a young woman standing at the threshold of his office door, which he'd left open. She didn't look familiar but it was early enough in the semester that he hadn't gotten to know all of his students yet. "Hi, can I help you?"

"Mr. Caffrey?"

"That's me. Come on in. I'm sorry, are you in one of my classes this semester?"

"No, I'm only a first year but I was hoping maybe you could give me some advice on what classes I should plan on taking later?"

"I'm not a freshman adviser, but sure. Take a seat. Can I ask who sent you in my direction? And what's your name?"

"My name is Bai Chou."

The name sounded vaguely familiar, but Neal wasn't sure from where. "Nice to meet you, Bai."

"I'm sure you don't remember, but we met before, actually."

Neal raised his eyebrows. "Really?"

"When I was a little girl my father had some problems at his restaurant and you came to our apartment--"

With a jolt, Neal remembered the case, more than ten years ago now. "Bai! I do remember. Of course!"

"Really?" She blushed and smiled.

"You were the little sock thief, how could I forget? And you helped us with translating. I just--wow, you're all grown up. So, you sound like you have a plan. What's your goal?"

"I, um, the FBI. Ever since I went in to the office there, it's been what I want to do."

"Wow, that's great. So, do you have your class schedule with you?"

Bai nodded and handed over a small tablet, and as Neal looked it over he thought about those early days with Peter. He looked forward to seeing Peter's face when he told him that Bai was in college and headed to the FBI, but for now he had a student to help.


	7. Drained timestamp

Timestamp to [Drained](http://archiveofourown.org/works/569298)

Neal sat in the passenger seat of Peter's car, contemplating the the reality of stairs. He wanted to go home and climb into his bed and sleep for several hours. He wanted to drink a glass of wine and lounge around like a wilted Victorian lady because he felt about that strong. The problem was that in between Neal and his wine and his bed there were approximately fifty stairs, and just the thought of walking up them was exhausting. It was strange--and not a little bit discomforting--to think that an injury he hadn't even noticed at the time could leave him so sapped of energy. Of life, really. Almost.

"You okay over there?"

Neal looked over at Peter and hated the concern he saw there. "I'm okay. I'm looking forward to getting home."

"Uh-huh. Are you sure I can't talk you into coming back to the house with me?"

"I just want to sleep in my own bed."

"Uh-huh. It's an awfully long trip up to that bed of yours."

Damn Peter for reading his mind. "That's the price I pay for the million dollar view."

"I'm going to ask you again--will you let me take you back to my place? I wouldn't mind being able to keep an eye on you, and you can rest without having to drag yourself up all of those stairs."

Neal felt his resolve crumbling, and he was too tired to shore it up. "Okay."

"Unless you have a sherpa in there. Has June employed a sherpa?"

"Peter, I said okay. Your house sounds--it sounds fine."

"Oh. Well, good. It'll take a while in this traffic so why don't you tilt your seat back and close your eyes?"

Neal closed his eyes, and before he could gather the energy to reach for the seat controls he slipped into sleep.

~~~

Peter's living room was pleasantly dim and cool, and Neal sat on the sofa with his eyes closed and his head tipped back against the wall. Walking down the block and up nine steps to the front door had been tiring enough that Neal was glad he hadn't gone back to June's. Peter would have insisted on following him in, and Neal would have ended up embarrassing himself by having to sit down on the stairs, and avoiding that was a good thing.

He had started to drift off into thoughts of the disastrous op that had led to his injury when the touch of a hand on his shoulder alerted him to Peter's presence.

"Neal?" Peter sounded far too concerned, and Neal opened his eyes to see Peter crouching down to look at him.

"Yes?"

Peter sighed and straightened up. "Sorry. You just looked a little too much like you did yesterday. I wish I had realized you needed help before you had almost bled out." Peter looked troubled as he sat down on the couch next to Neal. "That was a little too close."

Neal couldn't stop himself from thinking about the agent he'd seen he day before--dead, not even cold yet, a bullet hole torn through his forehead, and he shuddered at the memory.

"Are you cold?" Peter picked up a folded blanket from a basket next to the sofa and handed it over.

Neal was cold--hadn't felt warm since before everything had gone so wrong--but as he pulled the blanket up over himself he wasn't sure it would make any difference. "I'm a lot better off than Alan Johansen."

Peter took a deep breath and let it out slowly then reached up to squeeze Neal's shoulder. "I'm grateful for that," he said quietly.

Neal nodded and let his eyes close again.

"Okay. Okay, I'll leave you to get some rest."

"No." The word slipped out without Neal meaning to say it, and he opened his eyes to see Peter looking concerned again. "I mean, you don't have to." Neal didn't have a clear memory of what had happened after he sat down in the ER waiting room, but there was a vague sense of being very cold and very alone, like a man slowly drowning in the middle of a lake on a night with no wind, no moon or stars. He shivered, and something softened in Peter's eyes.

"I'll be right back." Neal closed his eyes again and listened as Peter moved around the house. When Peter settled onto the couch again a few minutes later he came laden with a pillow, another blanket and a small stack of files. He sat down at the other end of the sofa and handed the pillow to Neal. "Why don't you stretch out? Put your feet in my lap?"

It was a ridiculous proposition, but Neal's whole body felt heavy with exhaustion and all he wanted to do was sleep without having to be alone. Neal toed off his shoes then put the pillow on the arm of the couch and arranged himself on his side then tentatively stretched out to put his feet on Peter's lap. The warmth of the second blanket settled over him and then he felt Peter's hand cupping his ankle through the layers of fabric. The touch was just heavy enough to be grounding, and as he fell asleep Neal finally began to feel warm.


	8. They'll Turn Away No More timestamp

Timestamp to [They’ll Turn Away No More](http://archiveofourown.org/works/868272)

Neal curled up on the bed in Peter and Elizabeth's guest room and closed his eyes. All he wanted to do was sleep--sleep and hope that he would feel better when he woke up. He wasn't nauseated any more, not since the whatever they'd given him in the ER, but his whole body ached from the long hours spent on the bathroom floor, and a dull pain radiated from his stomach. He put his hand flat over his belly and tried to breathe around the pain. It was too much to sleep through, too little to complain about.

He heard a light knock on the door and looked up to see Elizabeth entering the room. If she wanted to have a conversation about Keller, about the position he had indirectly and inadvertently put her in, Neal wasn't in any position to refuse but he really didn't feel up to it either. His brain was moving much too slowly, worn down by fever and dehydration.

"I'm sure you're trying to sleep, but I brought you something that might help." She held up a cloth-wrapped bundle, and when Neal reached for it he was surprised to find it was warm. He blinked, thinking that she had brought him some kind of food, that he was going to have to find a way to politely refuse or else force it down into his aching stomach. A brief frown crossed Elizabeth's face, then she tilted her head and sat down delicately on the edge of the bed. "It's a heating pad. Here." She plucked the bundle from his hands and then completely invaded Neal's personal space to tuck it in under his t-shirt.

Neal jerked away from the heat then winced at the sharp movement, but then Elizabeth put her hand on his shoulder and kept the heating pad against his belly with her other hand. The warmth suffused into Neal's abused muscles, and he sighed at the relief of it, relaxing into her touch. Neal wasn't sure how long they stayed that way, Neal with his eyes closed and his senses focused on the pleasant warmth against his midsection and the comforting touch of another human being when he'd been so alone and sick all weekend.

Neal was very nearly asleep when Elizabeth briefly rubbed her hand over his upper arm then stood up, leaving the heating pad in place. "Thank you," Neal said, his voice sounding quiet and scratchy, and he forced his eyes open far enough to see her.

"You're welcome." She pressed her lips together then perched on the edge of the bed again. "I mean that literally, okay? You're welcome here in our home and you're welcome to call on me and Peter when you need help. We can talk more when you're feeling better but just remember that you're wanted here." She touched his arm again, squeezing gently. "Okay?"

Neal took in a deep breath--deeper than he'd been able to manage around the pain in his ribs before--and let it out slowly, feeling himself slipping down into sleep. Finally, finally. "Okay," he whispered into the darkness behind his eyes, and he fell asleep before he felt her leave.


	9. Dangers of Domesticity timestamp #1

Timestamp to [Dangers of Domesticity](http://archiveofourown.org/works/868269)

El walked out onto the back porch and watched Neal where he sat at the small table with his casted arm propped up on a pillow in front of him and his slippered feet stretched out onto the chair across from him. It was strange to see Neal in lounge pants and a t-shirt on a sunny, pleasantly warm afternoon, but his usual clothes were a little bit too difficult to deal with, between the cast and the pain and the pain pills. El had been planning to ask Neal what he felt like eating for lunch, but he was busy, entirely focused on decorating his cast.

He had a set of twenty-four different colored Sharpie markers laid out in front of him in an undulating gradient of hues, and on the uneven surface of his cast he was creating a rough reproduction of a detail from A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte. As El walked around the table, she saw that his eyes were barely open.

"Sweetheart?"

After a brief moment of delay, Neal perked his head up and smiled at her, sweet and just a little bit high. "Hey."

"You've been out here a while, I just wanted to check on you."

"Oh, I'm fine," Neal said, his voice slower and thicker than normal. "Just decided my cast was too white."

"Of course you did." El wrapped her arms around Neal's shoulders from behind and squeezed lightly before letting him go back to his work. Lunch could wait.


	10. Dangers of Domesticity timestamp #2

Timestamp to [Dangers of Domesticity](http://archiveofourown.org/works/868269)

Neal sighed as he tipped half a dozen Advils out onto the kitchen counter then put all but two back in the bottle. Working with only one hand was annoying--it had taken him a full two minutes to get the child-proof lid off--but his arm felt better in the sling, and if he wanted to avoid the pain pills that made him high enough to color on his cast then keeping his arm in the sling was a good idea. Peter walked in just as Neal was pressing the lid back on the bottle and frowned, that line forming between his eyebrows again.

"I could've helped you with that, you know."

"I can manage."

"Do you--you don't have a headache do you?"

"No, I have a broken wrist but you're giving me a headache." Neal instantly regretted snapping at Peter, but the pain and frustration of his injury was making him irritable. He sighed and walked back to the living room then sat down on the couch with his eyes closed. When he felt a cool touch against his hand he opened his eyes to see Peter standing there with a glass of ice water, that worried frown not quite gone. Neal accepted the glass with a small smile of apology and took a few sips as Peter sat down next to him.

"I'm sorry," Peter said, his voice low and serious.

"I'm sorry, too." Neal leaned his shoulder against Peter's. "You can relax though. This is--it's a nuisance injury. I'll be fine. I am fine."

Peter nodded but still looked troubled.

"Why are you so worried?"

Peter closed his eyes and sighed heavily, and when he looked at Neal again something in his eyes made Neal reach out for Peter's hand. Peter squeezed Neal's fingers and looked away. "When I was in college, undergrad, one of my friends fell off the low wall over some stairs when a bunch of us were clowning around. He got up, brushed it off, and the next day he ended up in the hospital, in surgery for bleeding in his brain."

Damn, Neal thought, and he opened his mouth to say something but Peter shook his head.

"He recovered, eventually, but he left school. His parents took him home, and at the time it felt like he was just gone. Like he'd died because we took his word that he was okay." Peter shook his head. "We're not dumb kids anymore."

"No." Neal wrapped his arm around Peter's shoulders and pulled him in closer. "I'm sorry that happened to your friend. I'm okay though--I didn't even hit my head at all."

"I'm trying to remember that. Just promise me you'll be honest about how you feel?"

"I promise. Right now, I feel like I'm walking around with an aching, useless arm, but I'm okay. I'm not going anywhere."

"I'm glad," Peter said. He leaned his head against Neal's, and the weight of it felt like love.


	11. Family Ties timestamp #1

Timestamp to [Family Ties](http://archiveofourown.org/works/868274)

Neal was stretched out on the couch in Peter and Elizabeth's living room trying to recover from the trauma of the ride back to their house and the trip up the front stairs. The most annoying part of the last sixteen hours or so was that, after all the drama of the aspirin and the allergic reaction and the slightly-less-awful-than-death treatment, his head still hurt. It was nothing like the searing explosion of pain that had ignited inside his head when the EMTs stuck a needle in his arm, nothing like the conflagration that had overwhelmed him during the ambulance ride and then cooled too slowly once he got to the hospital.

Now, his head just felt empty, scorched, flash-burned. It was a level of pain he could deal with, and if somebody's life or limb had depended on it he was pretty sure he could have pulled it together enough to walk around and function, but he was really glad he didn't have to do anything other than be still.

The house smelled good, like vanilla blended with something woodsy and spicy, and somehow that seemed just right for Peter and Elizabeth. They were vanilla--good, ordinary people--but there was more to them, a spark that most people couldn't have even if they tried, and together the two of them were strong. With his eyes closed, Neal breathed smoothly in and out through his nose letting that scent fill the burnt, empty space inside his head while he listened to El's footsteps as she moved around the house. Peter had brought him to the house then left to go meet up with Diana and Jones, and Neal would have been fine alone but it was nice to know he wasn't.

Neal was starting to feel too awake to lie still anymore, but the drugs the hospital had given to stop him from freaking out about the screaming pain in his head were still lingering in his system so he didn't quite have enough motivation to get up and do anything. He just opened his eyes, stretched his arms out over his head and sighed.

"Neal?" Elizabeth's smiling face moved into Neal's field of vision, and Neal smiled back at her. "I made tea if you want some."

"Sure, okay," Neal said, then realized he should be polite. "Thank you."

Elizabeth waved her hand casually. "Don't worry about it. I'll be right back."

She disappeared, and Neal took that as his cue to sit up so that he could drink without bathing himself in hot tea. The change in latitude inspired his head to send out a new flare of pain, but then it subsided back to the level he could tolerate with his eyes open. Elizabeth returned with a tray carrying two cups of tea and a plate with rows of apple slices, crackers and cheese. Neal wasn't hungry, not yet, but he liked looking at the orderly lines, the evidence of the work she had put into making something as simple as a snack.

Neal sipped the tea, and the warmth inside his mouth soothed the edges of his headache. "Seriously, thank you."

"Seriously, I don't mind. What's a sister for?" She grinned over the top of her tea cup.

"You were really good in there. You could have done very well in my former line of work."

She laughed. "Maybe. I can see where the thrill of it comes from, but I don't think I could keep it up for long."

Neal shrugged and sipped at his tea, and when he looked back over at Elizabeth he caught her looking at him. "What is it?"

"Nothing. Just, I don't know. It was good being there for you, but it was kind of weird being your sister."

Neal wasn't sure exactly what she meant, and he had the feeling he was wading into something too complex for the state of his head at the moment. "I appreciated you being there, even when it was awkward for you."

"Oh, no, I wanted to be there. I just don't normally think of you as a sibling." She said the words casually, but there was something in her eyes, something both questioning and challenging him.

"Hmm," Neal said noncommittally, taking another sip of his tea.

"Do you--" Elizabeth bit her lip and looked down, then looked up at Neal in a way that made him want to stare into her eyes until he got lost. "Do you think of me as a sister? Or—"

Oh. Neal wished he were more on top of his game, but sometimes life was like that--the biggest moments coming when he was least prepared. "No," he said, leaning a little bit closer, "I definitely don't think of you in a--a sisterly way. But I didn't expect--"

Elizabeth leaned in and kissed Neal's cheek then sat back, blushing slightly. "Of course you didn't. But stranger things have happened, right?"

"Every now and then," Neal said, feeling a surprising kind of hope for something he never let himself think could be real.

"I'll let you rest," she said as she stood up from the couch, and then she was gone, just Neal's teacup and the plate of snacks left behind. Neal's head spun slowly and he leaned back, telling himself, _This is real. Strangely enough, this is real._

Somehow, the pain in his head didn't matter so much anymore.


	12. Family Ties timestamp #2

Timestamp to [Family Ties](http://archiveofourown.org/works/868274)

[Okay, there's probably a broader story here, but this is what I have now. In a previous timestamp I established this story as moving in an OT3 direction, and this is set a few years later when Neal is off the anklet and they're all in a relationship together. There's probably some handwaving of reality here, too.]

Peter was pacing in the waiting room when El arrived. He wasn’t even certain that he was in the correct hospital, and between that and not knowing if Neal was okay or not he felt like he was losing his mind. El looked worried but relatively calm as she walked into the waiting room, and when she got close enough he leaned in for a kiss, desperate for a taste of that calmness. Then she turned her head to catch the kiss on her cheek, but before Peter could ask why she held up her hand.

“Just hold on. What did you tell them?”

“That I’m his partner, but that didn’t work and neither did my badge.”

“It might have worked better if you had your wedding ring on, hon.”

“Damn it.” Peter reached into his inside breast pocket and fished out his wedding ring, which he’d taken off for the undercover meeting he’d been headed to when he got a call from some old lady client of Neal’s security consulting business. She said that Neal had an allergic reaction and collapsed in her home, and she thought that the paramedics had been going to Lennox Hill but she hadn’t been sure. Neal had dropped his phone, and Peter had been his last call that morning.

“I have a plan,” El said, looking determined. “Follow my lead?”

“Always.”

El walked over to one of the people at the reception desk and smiled. “Excuse me, I believe my brother was taken here in an ambulance. His name is Neal Caffrey.”

“Do you have identification I can use to verify your relationship?”

Peter sighed but El just nodded and dug into the back of her wallet. “I’m married now, and I took my husband’s name. However, I knew there was something other than sentimental reasons that made me keep this old thing.”

She pulled out a thin plastic card, and Peter leaned in to see that it was a student ID with an old picture Peter recognized from one of her photo albums. The ID was worn, with faded stickers for years in the mid 90s, and the name on the card was Elizabeth Caffrey. The nurse behind the desk confirmed that Neal was a patient and then saw them back into the treatment area.

Neal was terribly pale and hooked up to both oxygen and an IV, but the doctor explained that he was only asleep, not unconscious. The next few hours were consumed with waiting for Neal to wake up and then making sure he was okay. When Peter finally knew that Neal would be coming home with them that evening, he cornered El in the hallway.

“Did Neal make that counterfeit ID for you?”

El raised one eyebrow. “Neal didn’t know anything about it. Hon, it’s not exactly a passport.”

He knew what she meant—it was a simple ID card, old enough to have no security features. Anybody with a color printer and some image editing software could replicate it, and it wasn’t a government-issued ID so so there wasn’t any real crime. Peter could have chosen to assume the work was Mozzie’s, but he knew that El had a quality color printer at work. He also knew that look in her eye.

“Sometimes I wonder what would’ve happened if you’d met Neal before you met me.”

El smiled and leaned in for a quick kiss that wouldn’t be too inappropriate for the in-laws they supposedly were then whispered in Peter’s ear, “Me too.”


	13. The Heart that Beats is Yours Inside Me timestamp

Timestamp to [The Heart that Beats is Yours Inside Me](http://archiveofourown.org/works/1180165)

Peter stretched out in his bunk, trying to find the least uncomfortable way to rest his body on the thin mattress. He knew that he should sleep, and he was at least alone in a small cell of his own, but he didn't think there was much chance of his mind relaxing enough to let him sleep. He was going to have to think through the events that had led to his arrest, untangle the threads of betrayal and ambition that had formed a noose to hang him. He was going to have to figure out a plan to prove his own innocence, but for the moment his mind was caught up on his current situation.

Peter had been through a number of difficult situations, from the brutal first days at Quantico to dicey undercover ops and a kidnapping, but being arrested and processed into the city lock-up was an entirely different experience. He had been processed indeed--moved from one place to another like a product on an assembly line, or perhaps more like a hung-up beef carcass with pieces taken away as it moved through the plant. He tried to maintain his own dignity, but there was no dignity in having his body cavities searched for foreign objects.

He wondered how many times Neal had been through the process of being stripped, weighed, measured and probed. He wondered if Neal ever got used to it.


	14. That Burns a Building Down timestamp #1

Timestamp to [That Burns a Building Down](http://archiveofourown.org/works/883373)

Rachel Franz had been around the Bureau long enough to know a few things. The first was that she was a good agent but she didn't have the temperament or the ambition to move up the ladder. If she had anything to say about it, she would be a Special Agent until she had her years in then take retirement and do something else. Work for herself maybe. Whatever.

The second thing she knew was that Phil Kramer was a total dick. He was a decent agent, though he didn't live up to the hype she'd heard when she was a fresh young probie, and he wasn't openly sexist but she could feel the undercurrent to his words. Female agents were never going to be quite as good as male agents in Phil Kramer's view of things, and there wasn't even any point in trying to prove him wrong. She could work herself into the ground without changing his mind, and that wasn't part of her plan.

She felt bad for the CI Kramer brought home from New York. He was cocky as hell and too pretty for her taste in men, but she didn't think he could possibly deserve having to be under Kramer's thumb the way he was. Kramer didn't believe in socializing at work, and most of the younger agents he'd brought onto the team were drinking his kool-aid, but Rachel didn't see what was so wrong with acting like a human being around the other human beings she worked with.

She kept herself under the radar, but when Diana Berrigan called her and asked her to act as a mail drop between Neal and his friends in New York she didn't hesitate. Kramer would blow a fuse if he found out, but the fall-out would surely be worse for Caffrey than for her. She didn't believe for a minute that OPR was going to care about note-passing, like some kind of junior high hall monitors. She had enough seniority that Kramer could only make her life but so hard, and subverting him in that small way put a smile on her face.

As the months went by, she started to get the impression that there was something more going on; this wasn't a game of secrets, this was a lifeline. She didn't make a habit of looking at Caffrey too much because a) not her type, and b) she didn't want anybody to get the impression he was her type, but as the Van Gogh case moved to its conclusion she started to notice that he looked rough around the edges. His clothes weren't as perfectly pressed and presented as they had ben, and there was something off about him. His cockiness was gone, or almost gone, and as much as she would normally be happy for a pretty boy like him to be taken down a notch she got the feeling that he'd slipped down a whole bunch of notches without really showing it.

She thought about contacting Diana but what was she supposed to say? And what could anybody in New York do? It seemed pointless to stir the pot so she kept her mouth shut. He really looked like hell before heading in to his inquisition, and when she heard shouting come from the conference room, somebody yelling about calling 911, she figured he'd passed out and brained himself on the table. She looked into the room just as he stopped shaking and went still . Kramer was telling 911 about a seizure, and one of the section chiefs had Caffrey turned over on his side, unconscious.

Feeling like a voyeur, Rachel went back to her desk and called Diana Berrigan because she didn't care what Kramer thought at this point. She barely got through explaining the situation when Diana told her to hold on, and then she was talking to Peter Burke, who sounded utterly unlike the staid but relatively easy-going agent she'd met on occasion. More quickly than Rachel expected, Burke said he was on his way. He asked her to call him with any updates, and she got the impression that he would beg if she made him.

She agreed to call him, and she did, passing on the hospital Caffrey was taken to and the small bits of information that she heard third-hand. She felt guilty, like she'd maybe been the only person to notice there was something wrong, maybe if she'd stuck her neck out things wouldn't have become so bad. Nonetheless, she couldn't change the past, and she was pragmatic enough to know there was no point in dwelling on it.

The next day, she went by the hospital after work to take him a card and see how he was doing since Kramer had gone silent on the topic. When she stuck her head in the room, she saw that he was asleep and that he had a visitor. She tip-toed in just to leave the card next to his bed, and realized that the visitor was Peter Burke, asleep with his head against the wall and his hand in Neal's hair.

Interesting.

She had a feeling they weren't going to be seeing Neal Caffrey in DC anymore.


	15. That Burns a Building Down timestamp #2

Timestamp to [That Burns a Building Down](http://archiveofourown.org/works/883373)

 

It was a coincidence, that Peter was allowed to remove Neal's anklet for the final time (please, god, let it be the final time) just days before the fourth of July. It was a coincidence, but Peter appreciated the way it felt like the whole city was celebrating Neal's freedom. The whole city was full of the spirit of Independence Day, and the fireworks that exploded above Central Park were only the most exuberant expression of that joy.

Neal was free of the anklet, and Peter was free of the obligations and restrictions that came with being the man who held the key. In the warm summer night, Peter sat in the open air with his wife under one arm and his lover under the other, and even though nobody was looking at them, even though nobody cared, there was a sweet freedom in knowing that it didn't matter.

In the year and a quarter since Peter had brought Neal back to New York, he’d bloomed back to his previous self--vibrant and healthy and startlingly beautiful. Neal still had to keep an eye on his stress level, but he would reach out when he needed help. He would reach out and one of them would reach back, and he would be okay. If Peter had anything to say about it, he'd always be okay.

Peter liked to think that this was the first of many Independence Days they would spend together like this, sitting together on a bench watching sparks from the fireworks plunge down toward the fountain, watching the angel with her wings reaching out to catch them. He could see it so clearly in his mind, all of them thirty years older and grown together like trees, leaning together to watch the skies explode in celebration.

 _Watch for us_ , he thought to the angel up there gathering her handful of sparks. _Watch for us._


	16. Too Much Contained timestamp

Timestamp to [Too Much Contained](http://archiveofourown.org/works/451996)

Neal woke up in a heavy darkness, his body folded up like a crushed soda can, and after a frantic moment of struggle he realized his situation. Chloroformed, kidnapped, bound up in some kind of box. He could see tiny seams between the boards, like chalky pinstripes against the black, and that along with the splintery feeling of rough wood behind him told him that it was a wooden crate, not airtight. He could feel the ropes around his ankles though there wasn't enough room to move his feet more than an inch or two. The ropes on his arms bit into his wrists and elbows, and he told himself to be calm, to focus on getting his hands free.

First he had to get the circulation back in his hands, and there was enough slack in the rope to make the small movements that got the blood flowing back into his stiff fingers. He pushed his torso hard against his thighs to take the weight off of his arms, but after long minutes of focusing on trying to slip the ropes he had to admit to himself that he hadn't made any progress. The ropes weren't budging. At all.

Neal gave in to frustration and panic and slammed his shoulders left and right, banged his feet against the wood in front of them, pushed his head against the lid above him, but he didn't have enough room to make any kind of impact. He was stuck. Completely stuck. With a desperate hope that there were people nearby, people who didn't know there was a man captive inside this wooden crate, Neal started to shout.

Nobody came. No sound of rushing feet. Nobody telling him to hold on. No sirens.

Neal shouted louder and then louder still until his throat burned and his chest ached, and when he stopped he thought he heard his own voice echoing around him in the quiet of his panting breaths. He tried to tell himself that Peter would find him but New York was a big place, and Neal could be anyway. He might as well have been nowhere.

He told himself to keep his calm, to keep it together so that he wouldn't be useless if an opportunity to escape came along. He played music in his head and tried to tell himself that perhaps it only felt like hours, maybe not much time had gone by, but then the complaints of his body started to tell a different story. He was hungry and thirsty, though neither of those situations were dire enough to be a problem. He also needed to pee, and that was less easy to ignore than the quiet grumblings of his stomach.

When he finally gave in, when the demands of his body took over from his pride, it felt like the first step of starting to die. There was enough air for him to breathe, and the temperature around him was neither freezing nor baking so he thought it would take a few days to die if he was left alone in his box, left to slowly turn into nothing. There were other possibilities, of course, and Neal wasn't sure if they were better or worse than dying cramped and dehydrated.

Somebody could come and shoot him without ever having to see his face. The box could be dumped in the river or set on fire. It could be buried in the ground or filled with lethal gas. So many different equations of time and pain and terror, and the only answer Neal could see was that he would die. He would never see Peter or El or June or Mozzie, not ever again. He'd never eat the food he'd picked up at the farmer's market. He'd never see the sun above him.

Neal lost himself then, for a while, floating in the cold, dark sea of hopeless fear. He came back to himself with a jolt when he heard something like a heavy door opening and then the pinstripes of light glowed brighter. Neal couldn't shout, couldn't move air through his sore, dry throat to yell for whoever had come to seal his fate.

And then he heard Peter's voice and the world exploded into a burning brightness. And then Peter's hands were on him, and the shame of having given in to his body's demands didn't matter as much as the slow-dawning understanding that he wasn't alone. He wasn't going to die, not like that.

His legs felt like trembling stilts that barely belonged to him but he forced himself to stand and walk with Peter's arms around him and Peter's hat protecting him from the knives of daylight assaulting his eyes. He left the box behind, and he didn't look back.


	17. Strengths and Weaknesses timestamp

Timestamp to [Strengths and Weaknesses](http://archiveofourown.org/works/868271)

Neal had a story he told people when they asked about his family and wouldn't accept his flat-voiced, "We're not close," as a sufficient answer. It was a sad story involving long-dead parents and a homophobic aunt. Sad, but not juicy enough to lead to a long conversation. One of the things Neal liked about Peter was that he didn't make Neal lie.

Neal had tried to keep things light with Peter because he didn't see how he could be close to anybody without lying to them, and he didn't want to lie to Peter. Neal let Peter get the impression that he was sleeping his way around the campus, and they spent time together but not too much. It was, Neal assumed, a time-limited problem because Peter was going to graduate and move on with his life, and Neal would just be a guy he'd slept with a bunch of times. Nothing special.

When Peter inevitably asked about Neal's family, Neal gave his stock short answer, and Peter just looked at him for a long moment. "Okay," he said, and it didn't sound like _Okay, I don't really care anyway_ , or _Okay, I'll needle you more about it later_. Peter's eyes and the set of his mouth said something more like, _I know you're holding back on me, but I'm not going to push you_ , and something about that made Neal feel strangely safe.

The spring semester was ending and graduation impending, and when Neal hadn't seen Peter in a week he figured that was it. When Peter showed up outside the dining hall at the end of Neal's shift, Neal thought they'd go back to Peter's single. One last fuck for the road sounded pretty good, but Peter just wanted to talk. Neal followed him to some chairs in a quiet corner in the student union building, and Peter swallowed nervously before straightening his shoulders.

"I don't think I have anything to lose, so I'm just going to say this. Neal, I care about you. Sometimes I think I barely even know you, but I care about you a lot. I want to be something more than--than a friend you have sex with sometimes, and I need to know if you think you might want that with, uh, me." Peter looked embarrassed and pained, and Neal felt his pulse thudding in his ears.

"I'm not sure that I understand why you're asking me this now when you're graduating. You're leaving."

"Well, yes and no." Peter rubbed at the back of his neck. "Yeah, I'm graduating, but I decided to stay here. I'm going to be over on the law school campus for the most part so we probably won't see each other much if you don't want to. But I won't be far."

"Oh. I--I--" Neal found himself at a loss for words for one of the very few times in his life.

"Look, I'm not asking you to marry me. It's okay if you don't know for sure, but will you tell me the truth about one thing?" At Neal's nod, Peter continued, "Do you care about me more than whatever other guys you're sleeping with?"

"Yes," Neal said quickly because there wasn't any question.

Peter smiled then, pleased and a little bit surprised. "Okay. Okay. So, I'm going to be busy with my parents for the next couple of days and then I'll be heading home for the summer, but I'll see you in August. You have plans for the summer?"

"I'm good," Neal said. He was going to be waiting tables and subletting couch space in an apartment with about six other people. It was a plan.

Peter gave him a measuring look then nodded. "Good." He pulled a scrap of paper out of his pocket and held it out. "This is the phone number at my parents' house if you need it."

Neal hesitated before taking the number. "I don't have a number for where I'll be staying." Neal hadn't even thought about it. "I guess I didn't think that anybody would need to reach me."

"It's okay. Just take it, call me sometime."

Neal took the scrap of paper and carefully put it in his wallet. "Okay."

When Peter leaned in and kissed him, it felt like the sealing of a deal, the making of a promise. Neal tried to believe that he was somebody who could make that kind of promise.


	18. The Grief at the Center of Your Dream timestamp

Timestamp to [The Grief at the Center of your Dream](http://archiveofourown.org/works/425757)

As much as Neal had resolved to do whatever was necessary to get himself together, he went into the therapy session Peter set up for him with no intention of playing along. He'd had a few decent nights sleep by then, and he didn't feel shaky anymore. At least not all the time. At least when he wasn't thinking about Kate.

Then he walked into the therapist's office, prepared to charm his way out of the whole thing, and that whole plan fell apart. The therapist was a older man, probably ex-military, and though Neal spent the entire session trying to slip underneath the man's straightforward demeanor he didn't get anywhere. The session didn't do Neal any good, but he was interested enough in the challenge to set another appointment.

At the third appointment, Neal sat across from the guy who was looking steadily back at him, and he gave up, gave in. He couldn't talk about Kate with Peter or anybody else with the FBI because there was too much conflict there, too many sore spots. He and Mozzie were carefully not talking about the idea that Neal had come close to taking off with Kate and leaving Mozzie behind, and talking about Kate would only make that more difficult. June would've listened, but he didn't want her to feel sorry for him. This guy, the therapist, he wasn't likely to feel sorry for Neal, and he didn't give a damn about who Kate had been to Neal, but when Neal opened his mouth and started to talk he listened.

Neal talked about what he'd loved about her, the life he'd planned to spend with her, the things they'd done together. He talked about his anger and his grief until it bled out of him and left his mind cool and empty and still. There was work he needed to do and he felt ready. Finally, he felt ready.


	19. Swim the Silent Slipstream Inside of Me timestamp

Timestamp to [Swim the Silent Slipstream Inside of Me](http://archiveofourown.org/works/463721)

One month before:

El wasn't one for preliminaries, when there was something to talk about that didn't involve any guilt on her part. They were working together in the kitchen, Peter peeling and de-veining shrimp while El chopped vegetables, when she surprised Peter yet again.

"Hon, does Neal know you're bi?"

Peter was surprised enough to almost take a chunk out of his thumb with the knife, but then he put it down and turned to look at El. "No, God no. I don't think so."

"I wonder. Sometimes I think he flirts with you more than he flirts with me."

"Neal flirts with everybody who has a pulse, so I don't think it means much." Peter shook his head. "And mostly he flirts with disaster."

"You know, it wouldn't be disaster if something happened between the two of you, at least not as far as I'm concerned."

"No. No, I don't think Neal feels like that about me. I don't see that happening. At all."

"Hmmm." El closed her eyes for a moment, then opened them and gave Peter a dirty smile. "I can see it just fine."

"You are nothing but trouble." Peter grabbed a towel to wipe the shrimp juice off his hands as he walked around the kitchen island, and then he put his hands in El's hair and kissed her--on her lips that tasted like red bell pepper and on the gentle curve of her jaw that was nothing like Neal's sharp-edged face.

"That's just the way you like me," she whispered in his ear. "And just the way you like Neal, too." She cupped her hands around Peter's ass and pulled him in closer. "One day, you're going to come home and tell me you made love to him, and you're going to show me everything you did."

Peter didn't know how he could let that happen, but his body liked the idea, liked it a lot. He rubbed against the curve of El's hip and breathed in the last traces of her perfume. "I will," he said, believing it at last. "I will.”


	20. A Hole in You I Never Saw timestamp

Timestamp to [A Hole In You I Never Saw](http://archiveofourown.org/works/425756)

Neal woke with his head aching fiercely and the traces of some kind of wicked nightmare teasing at the edges of his thoughts. He opened his eyes to see far too much light for early morning, then sat up quickly enough to make his head spin.

"Hey," Peter said, and Neal jerked his head around to see Peter sitting at the table with his laptop open in front of him. "Good morning."

Neal blinked, not entirely sure if he was actually awake. He looked down at himself, wrapped up in a blanket with a rumpled t-shirt and suit pants underneath, and the word blanket made him think he ought to be remembering something. "Um, what happened?"

"That's what I'd like to know." Peter closed the laptop and stood up, then went to the fridge and poured a glass of water from the filter pitcher. He walked over, sat down and handed the glass to Neal.

Neal took a cautious sip and looked at Peter sitting there in jeans and a henley even though Neal was almost certain it was a work day. "I'm starting to get a little freaked out here. Why are you here, and why am I half dressed on the couch? I--" Neal searched his memory for the last thing that he was sure wasn't a nightmare. "I went out after work, but I know I didn't get drunk. I wouldn't."

"I know." Peter took a deep breath and let it out on a sigh. "I don't know how it happened, but somebody drugged you. June called me because she heard a...a ruckus, and when I got here you were experiencing hallucinations."

Neal ran a hand over his face, trying to absorb that. "Wow. I don't--I wouldn't have taken drugs."

"I know. I know that. After you get cleaned up and have some breakfast, I have some memory techniques we're going to use to try to figure out who did this to you."

Neal nodded. "And why." He could remember panic and fear, formless and huge, and then a steady voice that put the world back together. "I didn't hurt anybody did I, you or June?"

"No, not at all. You mortally wounded a lamp, that's all."

"Okay." Neal drank the rest of the water then stood up slowly, still feeling like the world was just slightly off-center of where it was supposed to be. He looked at Peter and thought about the steady voice and the blanket he'd woken with. "Thank you. For taking care of me and for knowing I didn't take whatever it was on purpose, thank you."

Peter shrugged. "You'd do the same for me."

He was right. Neal thought, hoped, he was right.


	21. Whatsoever I've Feared timestamp

Timestamp to [Whatsoever I’ve Feared](http://archiveofourown.org/works/550042)

 _There's something different in his eyes_ , Kate thought as she sat down across from Neal on yet another Wednesday morning.

"Neal, what happened," she asked, and her stomach dropped when she saw him go still, the glimpse of something horrible in his eyes shuttered behind a bland, reassuring smile. "Please don't lie to me." She kept her voice quiet but firm, and he looked down.

She reached out to touch the glass barrier between then, and wished with a sharp jolt of pain that she could reach through it and touch Neal, hold his hand and feel at least some part of the truth. When he'd been in jail prior to his trial, she'd been able to meet with him at a table with no glass between them. The rule was no touching, but she could take his hand for a moment before the guard's reprimand made her pull away. And now something had happened, but she could see he wasn't going to tell her. He thought she was still the girl he'd met in New York; he thought she was still innocent.

When he looked up, he met her eyes and let her inside enough to see the pain again. "I didn't get hurt," he said, and she understood that it was the truth and a lie, both at the same time.


	22. Moments You Can't Understand timestamp

Timestamp to [Moments You Can’t Understand](http://archiveofourown.org/works/1058757)

Neal was awake when he heard the tap on the door to his temporary bedroom, and then Peter opened the door and looked inside.

“Oh good,” Peter whispered, looking at Ben who was asleep on the bed next to Neal. “I started to worry when he wasn’t in his room.”

Neal nodded and looked back down at Ben then slowly swung his legs around to get out of bed. “Can you help me up?” Neal asked, whispering as well.

Wordlessly, Peter put his arm around Neal and lifted him to his feet, moving slowly but not stopping at Neal’s pained breaths. Peter backed off once Neal was upright but kept a hand on him as he limped out of the room and down the hall to the downstairs bathroom. A few minutes later, Peter helped Neal to the kitchen and got him situated with his leg elevated.

“I’m going to let him stay home from school,” Neal said as Peter puttered around making toast.

“Yeah? You might get more rest if he’s out of the house for a while.”

“It’s okay. He can keep me company and fetch me snacks.”

“Ah, now I see the reason people have kids.”

“Yeah.” Neal traced the line of the woodgrain on the table, only looking up when Peter put a glass of orange juice and some pills on the table in front of him. “Thanks. And thanks again for taking care of Ben the past few days.”

“You’re welcome. I wouldn’t have it any other way.”

Neal nodded. “He came down last night because he had a nightmare. I don’t think he’s had a nightmare like that in two years. It was more like just after his mother died.” Neal took the pills and rubbed a hand over his face, feeling too tired to deal with this but knowing that he had to. He’d been half out of it from the pain pills and the lingering exhaustion from blood loss and surgery when he’d woken up in the middle of the night to Ben crawling into his bed crying and clinging to him like a little boy rather than the worldly pre-teen he tried to be most days.

Peter didn’t reply with words. He just put a plate with two pieces of buttered toast on the table in front of Neal and patted him on the shoulder before taking a seat across the table. Neal nibbled at the toast, knowing he needed it to go with the pain pills and antibiotics. “What you said yesterday about keeping me out of the field, I think I’m going to take you up on it. There will be exceptions to that, I’m sure, but I don’t want to do this to him again. Not if it’s avoidable.”

“Good.” Peter nodded. “Thank you.”

Neal ate another piece of toast then felt himself starting to fall asleep.

“Come on, let’s get you back to bed.”

Neal felt too drained to help very much, so he let Peter halfway haul him back to the bedroom then help him get situated under the covers. Ben was still sound asleep, and Neal was glad to have him close. Later, they’d wake up and then spend the day watching Netflix together, and maybe Ben would sleep the next night through without nightmares. Maybe Neal would be able to do the same.


	23. Chilled to the Bone timestamp

Timestamp to [Chilled to the Bone](http://archiveofourown.org/works/1180154)

Neal woke up and shivered. Damn it, he thought. According to the alarm clock it was early morning, nearly time for he and Peter to get up for work, and he was still cold from getting drenched in icy water the day before. As he started to wake up more, Neal felt a heavy ache in his head, and when he pushed himself up to sit the tickle in his throat startled him by turning into a dry cough.

"Wha--Neal?"

Neal couldn't answer right away, but he felt Peter's hand on his back and finally his lungs calmed down and he was able to take a deeper breath. "Sorry for waking you."

"Hush. What's going on? You feel pretty warm."

"No, cold." Neal leaned into the warm bulk of Peter's chest and thought about falling back to sleep right there but he felt Peter gently pushing him away.

"Here, lean against the pillows for a minute. I'll be right back."

Neal did as he was told, since arguing seemed like something that would take a lot of effort, and before he could figure out what else to do Peter was back sitting next to him in bed with the dim bedside light on.

"Open up, I want to take your temperature." Peter slipped the thermometer between Neal's lips and they sat there together quietly, Peter's hand petting Neal's hair back from his forehead, until the thermometer beeped. "101. Drink some water and take some Tylenol, okay?"

"Mmm, okay." Neal sat up straighter and took the pills Peter put in his hand then drank the glass of water, wincing at the discomfort of swallowing with his sore throat. "Where's my phone?"

"Don't worry about your phone. I'll call you in sick."

Neal thought he should argue, but curling up back under the covers sounded so much more appealing. He felt Peter's hand in his hair again as he drifted back to sleep.


End file.
